Practicing watercolor, and here we are – once more addicted! My new routine is artwork in any form, and then some sewing or other fiber arts. Gardening soon now that it isn’t raining. Life in quarantine hasn’t changed our lives much here – no kids to home school – but it has helped to focus on what is important in our lives besides food!
9×12 Arches watercolor, done mostly with a angle brush and rigger. Some gouache used.
This scan has a really greenish cast for some reason – or maybe I just used a lot of green without realizing it. Anyway, given the fact that yesterday’s painting looked like it was sliding uphill into the ocean (art can do that, even if reality can’t), I worked on it again, this time using gouache. Here, the sand works a lot better – at least it seems to be doing the right sandy thing!
Maybe some watercolor tomorrow of the same subject?
I have been busy sewing masks for friends and family, and it’s been a slow process, taking a lot of time. However, I am back to my determination to paint or draw something every day, either in the morning or in the afternoon. As I had an appointment this morning, I used this rainy, rainy afternoon to paint the Goleta Slough. Or part of it. Generally speaking, I rather like it – all those little dabs of white, grey, and black are seagulls and other critters. The sand jutting out needs to be fixed – seems like it is riding upward or something, but …. ?
Still working in pastel. I cleaned up the pastels I was using yesterday by putting them in a container of corn meal and shaking them gently. It did the job. I also took a different approach to today’s painting, and the difference is evident to me (cuz I did it!).
I decided to use a piece of 7×11 Uart 800 sanded pastel paper, which is the finest grit in the Uart series. I bought a sample pack a while back, and now that I think I get how to use pastels fairly well, I thought it was time to begin. Having cleaner pastels also helped. I also decided to work from light to dark this time, like a watercolor, and it seems to have been a bit more successful. My colors were getting rather muddy in the last one. I also did not apply any fixative to the painting until it was done. In the others I had used workable fixative between layers.
Overall, rather a bit more pleased with this pastel painting than yesterday’s. It was more pleasant to do, probably in part because I simplified my approach. Working light to dark – putting in the sky and water first – may also have helped. The Uart 800 sanded pastel paper was really nice, too, and gave a nice smooth finish as the paper has a very fine tooth to it. I used a final fixative on it, but I am still unsure how many layers of final fixative are to be used.
Now, time to attach sleeves to the sweater I am knitting!
I wanted to give this a romantic name, like Last Light Before the Storm, but the fact is, this is just a disaster! The only thing I like are the bright trees and the sky’s gloom, but altogether, it is overworked and definitely not very good.
‘Nuff said!
Ink, Yarn & Beer 